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DEATH OF THE WHITE FAWN.

THE wanton troopers, riding by,
Have shot my fawn, and it will die.
Ungentle men! they cannot thrive
Who killed thee. Thou ne'er didst, alive,
Them any harm; alas! nor could
Thy death yet do them any good.
I'm sure I never wished them ill, -
Nor do I for all this, nor will ;
But if my simple prayers may yet
Prevail with Heaven to forget
Thy murder, I will join my tears,
Rather than fail. But, O my fears!
It cannot die so. Heaven's king

Keeps register of everything;

And nothing may we use in vain ;

Even beasts must be with justice slain,-
Else men are made their deodands.
Though they should wash their guilty hands
In this warm life-blood, which doth part
From thine and wound me to the heart,
Yet could they not be clean, their stain
Is dyed in such a purple grain ;
There is not such another in
The world to offer for their sin.
Inconstant Sylvio, when yet

I had not found him counterfeit,
One morning (I remember well),
Tied in this silver chain and bell,
Gave it to me; nay, and I know
What he said then, I'm sure I do :
Said he, "Look how your huntsman here
Hath taught a fawn to hunt his dear!"
But Sylvio soon had me beguiled :
This waxed tame, while he grew wild;
And, quite regardless of my smart,
Left me his fawn, but took his heart.
Thenceforth I set myself to play
My solitary time away

With this; and, very well content,
Could so mine idle life have spent.
For it was full of sport, and light
Of foot and heart, and did invite
Me to its game. It seemed to bless
Itself in me; how could I less
Than love it? O, I cannot be
Unkind to a beast that loveth me!

Had it lived long, I do not know
Whether it, too, might have done so
As Sylvio did, his gifts might be
Perhaps as false, or more, than he.
For I am sure, for aught that I
Could in so short a time espy,
Thy love was far more better than
The love of false and cruel man.
With sweetest milk and sugar, first
I it at mine own fingers nursed ;

And as it grew, so every day

It waxed more white and sweet than they. It had so sweet a breath! and oft

I blushed to see its foot more soft

And white shall I say than my hand? Nay, any lady's of the land.

It is a wondrous thing how fleet
'T was on those little silver feet.
With what a pretty, skipping grace
It oft would challenge me the race;
And when 't had left me far away,
"T would stay, and run again, and stay;
For it was nimbler much than hinds,
And trod as if on the four winds.
I have a garden of my own,

But so with roses overgrown,
And lilies, that you would it guess

To be a little wilderness;

And all the springtime of the year

It only loved to be there.
Among the beds of lilies I

Have sought it oft, where it should lie
Yet could not, till itself would rise,
Find it, although before mine eyes;
For in the flaxen lilies' shade
It like a bank of lilies laid.
Upon the roses it would feed,
Until its lips even seemed to bleed ;
And then to me 't would boldly trip,
And print those roses on my lip.
But all its chief delight was still
On roses thus itself to fill ;
And its pure virgin limbs to fold
In whitest sheets of lilies cold.
Had it lived long, it would have been
Lilies without, roses within.

O, help! O, help! I see it faint,
And die as calmly as a saint!
See how it weeps! the tears do come,
Sad, slowly, dropping like a gum.
So weeps the wounded balsam ; so
The holy frankincense doth flow;
The brotherless Heliades

Melt in such amber tears as these.
I in a golden phial will
Keep these two crystal tears, and fill
It, till it do o'erflow with mine;
Then place it in Diana's shrine.

Now my sweet fawn is vanished to
Whither the swans and turtles go,
In fair Elysium to endure,

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With milk-white lambs, and ermines pure.
O, do not run too fast! for I

Will but bespeak thy grave — and die.
First, my unhappy statue shall
Be cut in marble; and withal,
Let it be weeping too. But there
The engraver sure his art may spare ;

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There did a thousand memories roll upon him,
Unspeakable for sadness. By and by
The ruddy square of comfortable light,
Far-blazing from the rear of Philip's house,
Allured him, as the beacon-blaze allures
The bird of passage, till he madly strikes
Against it, and beats out his weary life.

For Philip's dwelling fronted on the street, The latest house to landward; but behind, With one small gate that opened on the waste, Flourished a little garden square and walled : And in it throve an ancient evergreen, A yew-tree, and all round it ran a walk Of shingle, and a walk divided it :

But Enoch shunned the middle walk and stole Up by the wall, behind the yew; and thence That which he better might have shunned, if griefs

Like his have worse or better, Enoch saw.

For cups and silver on the burnished board
Sparkled and shone; so genial was the hearth;
And on the right hand of the hearth he saw
Philip, the slighted suitor of old times,
Stout, rosy, with his babe across his knees;
And o'er her second father stoopt a girl,
A later but a loftier Annie Lee,
Fair-haired and tall, and from her lifted hand
Dangled a length of ribbon and a ring

To tempt the babe, who reared his creasy arms,
Caught at and ever missed it, and they laughed :
And on the left hand of the hearth he saw
The mother glancing often toward her babe,
But turning now and then to speak with him,
Her son, who stood beside her tall and strong,
And saying that which pleased him, for he smiled.

Now when the dead man come to life beheld His wife his wife no more, and saw the babe Hers, yet not his, upon the father's knee, And all the warmth, the peace, the happiness, And his own children tall and beautiful, And him, that other, reigning in his place, Lord of his rights and of his children's love, Then he, though Miriam Lane had told him all, Because things seen are mightier than things heard, Staggered and shook, holding the branch, and feared

To send abroad a shrill and terrible cry, Which in one moment, like the blast of doom, Would shatter all the happiness of the hearth.

He therefore turning softly like a thief, Lest the harsh shingle should grate under foot, And feeling all along the garden-wall, Lest he should swoon and tumble and be found, Crept to the gate, and opened it, and closed,

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